When I read the powerful The Lie That Tells a Truth, I began thinking of a character who wasn’t me, but who’d gone through what I had and come out the other side. Jess Cassidy burst into life.
Her Next Hero begins with:
He shouldn’t fly.
I shoved my doubts down and shivered as my fiancé completed his pre-flight check. Steel-colored clouds clamped down on the mountains that dwarfed Finn’s twin-engine Beechcraft.
Finn walked a final time around his plane, then came toward me and wrapped me in his arms. Instant warmth. Instant all’s-right-with-the-world.
And then moves right into the story. Was it my story? Not really, Jess became a character of her own. Except—I borrowed from real-life. Like the time I kicked an abuser who came into the workplace to abduct a domestic violence victim and the day I faced off against a Darth Vader supervisor who intended firing a quality employee as she navigated stage 3 cancer. Even how the Darth clone makes my blood boil. But I gave him a lovely “come to goodness” moment in the novel.
If you haven’t yet tried writing a story or novel, I promise it’s addictive. The characters become real. And if you live in a beautiful area, you’ll be able to introduce readers to settings that give them the chance to see your world. I loved taking my readers flying past the Tokositna mountains, with the plane almost flying sideways as it knifed its way past jagged cliff switchbacks through steep mountains, until they exited the plane into a day as brought as a shout.
So—here’s my dare—dare to write. I’d love to hear from you. And I have huge news coming out in my next newsletter.
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